Commercial LED vs Fluorescent Fluorescent Tubes: The Winner

Typically in lower level ceilings in places like offices, hallways, and lobby rooms we find tube lights installed in the ceiling. Two of the most popular technologies that are found in their fixtures include fluorescent and LED. But while fluorescents were the winner for the longest time; LED is quickly catching up in popularity and becoming the “go to” lighting technology for office buildings and the like. Why exactly? Well this post will probably shed some insight on that point as well.

But when you come up with the decision of choosing either LED or fluorescent tubes, which should you choose? And better yet, why should you choose one over the other?

To let you in on the “winner” of the obvious winner, it’s the commercial LED tubes and the fluorescent ones are on the losing end of the battle. For reasons from more efficient to higher quality, we are going share and explain why LED products simply win in almost every (if not every) aspect of commercial lighting and it’s requirements.

Defining Your Lighting Needs

Before we start talking about why LED is the clear winner in virtually every aspect, we need to discuss the topic of defining your lighting needs.

What type of building are you in (or just area you need light in)? Here are some common areas / applications you made encounter:

• Office Floor Area
• Private Office Rooms
• Hallways
• Lobby
• Meeting Rooms
• And so on…

Basically anywhere that the ceiling is low will typically involve a commercial tube to be the lighting source.

If no areas like such exist in your building (rare) then tubes probably aren’t for you. This is common in industrial sized warehouses and factories where ceiling are very high.

Why LED is the winner:

Now that we’ve identified who the winner is of LED vs fluorescent tubes, we can now discuss why exactly LED systems simply win over the competitions products.

As you can tell from each winning benefit, the reasons LED wins will only get more and more obvious, Let’s start off with the first major reason that wins 90% of people over to making the switch from fluorescent to LED tubes.

More efficiency with LED:

LED is known to reduce energy consumption by upwards of 50% or more when replacing fluorescent lighting. This can allow you to actually see a ROI for your investment of a LED lighting system.

Save more with qualifying rebates:

Utility company’s like to “reward” those who install qualified efficient lighting systems into their buildings. By installing commercial tubes that are qualified (typically by DesignLights Consortium), you open your business up to rebate opportunities that may of not been available previously with fluorescent technology installed in your building. Rebates will allow you to generate a larger and quicker ROI for your investment in new lights, which is huge for any business’s bottom line.

Less heat generated:

A common problem with lower ceiling lights (like tubes) is the heat that they generate. Especially with fluorescent fixtures which generate excess heat; it can cause for increased cooling costs by having to offset the heat generated by your lights. This is yet another way to lower your operating costs by allowing you to turn down the air control and use less of it. With LED compared to fluorescent; LED generates very little and virtually no heat compared to any other competing technologies.

Quality light:

Believe it or not; LED also offers higher quality of light and better options. Certain color temperatures allow for higher productivity in the workplace; which can again decrease costs and even increase revenue. Quality light has been proven to decrease stress while increasing productivity, and this is a major benefit of LED lighting; especially in a office like environment.

Another note is this: LED will never flicker nor buzz. If you’ve experienced this type of issue: LED will solve this issue. They never flicker nor buzz not even when they are nearing the end of their lifespan. Flickering / buzzing lights goes back to the higher productivity. From experience you probably know that just a few minutes under such lights can prove to become irritable and decrease your attention on your work and more on the low quality lighting.

Notes:

The benefits of LED tube lighting system are obvious over the competing fluorescent technology. Have any other benefits that LED or fluorescent may have that we missed? Let us know in the comments below!

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How LED Food Grade Lighting Will Improve Your Facility

With any type of facility we talk about, LED lighting seemingly always improves the environment and facility in so many ways that just beats all other technologies. Lighting within a food production environment is even more critical to get right otherwise it could lead to some issues.

If you are a facility manager, building owner, or just a general manger for a facility or building that deals with food production you probably know the requirements for your lighting system. They’ve got to be washed down, and be able to withstand that. They must be food safe, and if broken be able to clean up safely, and so on.

Common technologies in food production building consist of metal halide, HPS, and more and more often we are seeing LED technology being installed. Here we are going to discuss the added benefits that LED can bring to your lighting system within your facility and how much they can improve your buildings standards.

LED reduces costs. It’s practically a known fact that LED can save you money when it comes to your energy bill. But how much exactly people often don’t really know. So, how much can LED fixtures save you vs metal halide or HPS fixtures? The savings can be up to 50% or more! That’s a surprising and staggering number to any building; small or large. If you run your lights 12 hours a day, imagine the savings you could realize by making the switch away from older technologies to LED.

They last longer. Food grade lighting can be a pain to change out when they burn out and no longer work. You often have to be very careful as to not break the light which could force you to stop your production line which costs you money. Since LEDs can last 2-3 times longer; it will require less changing of bulbs and more production time on the line. The added benefit to longer fixture life food grade LED lights can bring is a reduced maintenance cost. We all know changing lights high up can be costly; especially when your lights burn out quickly. If you can increase your lights life span by 2-3 times; this incurs a 2-3 times decrease in maintenance cost related to the switching of your bulbs. This alone can be a huge cost saving benefit that appeals to any facility manager or building owner that is cost-saving oriented.

High quality light is produced. LEDs not only offer higher quality of light but also a wider range of light too. This creates a safer environment for everyone within the facility; which is especially important to your line workers or any guests that you may have. Liabilities in the workplace can cost you bigtime and it’s almost paramount to such fragile and dangerous environments to put safety first. On top of the quality of light LED offers; the lumen depreciation is much slower and less overall. This allows for you to buy less lights initially to avoid overcompensation for your lumen degradation of 1, 5, and 10 years. This can prove to be a great way to ensure your lighting doesn’t become useless after just a few years due to high depreciation in lumens. This high lumen depreciation we talk about is very popular in regards to HPS and MH technology; which depreciate at much higher rates than LED products do.

They meet food code standards. As long as you ensure to buy fixtures specifically qualified for food grade environments; LEDs can prove to be an approved lighting fixture that meets food code standards. Only thing we warn is to always question and ask your supplier that they meet food standards in your state and country. Any reputable company will be able to answer these questions, but you should also be prepared to educate yourself to avoid not-to-code light fixtures.

Conclusion

There you have some reasons that LED food grade systems will greatly improve your food production building.

Always remember these few key points and you’ll be much more likely to gain approval of an upgrade to LED products from those above you:

●     They save lighting energy costs by 50% or more

●     They offer quality lighting that increases safety and consistency in your products

●     They can meet food code standards (just be sure to educate yourself and ask questions!)

There you go, keep all of these things in mind next time you run into issues with your lighting. Have questions? Ask them in the comments!

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4 Reasons to Invest in Indoor LED Grow Lights

The grow light market is growing, and growing fast. With the uptick in demand and competition,  better and higher standards of grow lighting systems have increased in efficiency and overall quality. This is why it’s paramount to understand the importance of LED grow technology versus other less efficient and simply outdated grow technologies.

If you’ve been considering an investment in indoor grow lights; don’t get caught up in buying technologies like HPS or metal halide simply because they are initially cheaper. Overtime, you will have wished you invested in indoor LED grow lighting systems for all of the following 4 reasons and benefits they offer. As with anything, cheaping out is seemingly better option initially but overtime you will realize lower margins on your crops and higher expenses and ongoing costs associated with outdated grow technology. The following 4 reasons shouldn’t be ignored and should be looked into and researched more to get a true overview of the best option to go with when it comes to grow lights. Here they are…

1) LED offers longer life span.

Believe it or not the life span of your lighting can make or break your growing venture. Consider this: would you rather spend 1.5 times more but get a fixture that will last twice as long? Or would you rather cheap out and get something that will need replacing far before LED technology would and have to buy new lights more often? The answer is obvious: the first option. Because although it’s cheaper initially to go with outdated products like HPS, it will cost you more when it comes to the end of the life for your lights. You’ll wish you had invested in LED, trust me on that one!

2) Targeted  wavelengths for optimal growing conditions.

LED plant lights offer more options for targeted wavelengths that match your need for grow light conditions. Depending on the stage of your plants; this is a highly important option to have available to you as a grower. Full spectrum LED grow lights allow you to target very specific wavelengths which other technologies simply don’t typically offer. As any professional (or even beginners know) this is highly invaluable when it comes to the quality of your crop and grow setup.

3) Less heat generated.

All LED technology produce virtually no heat compared to other heat exhaustive technologies. LED’s can reduce your lighting heat generation by unprecedented numbers. An incandescent grow light could produce 80 BTU’s per hour while the comparable LED grow light would be producing only 2.5 BTU / hour. If heat is an issue (and it typically is for indoor growers), you can greatly and virtually get rid of that issue by buying, switching, or upgrading to grow light LED products.

4) Less watts, same light.

LED lights in all markets are known for their energy saving benefits, and it’s often the biggest reason people make the switch over to them. Grow lighting LEDs can offer you energy reduction by up to 50% or more which can seriously increase your bottom line. Being an indoor grower, you know that energy costs are one of your biggest expenses and a savings in 50% of energy costs can be huge for any grower (small, medium, or large scale in size).

Conclusion

That about wraps it up for the 4 biggest reasons to invest in high end indoor grow lighting systems. The benefits are obvious overall in just about every single aspect when it comes to grow lighting. The only downside is that LEDs are typically a little bit higher in initial investment. But with all these benefits, the higher initial investment will pay back itself and then some. Don’t be put off by the higher initial costs because if you are a serious grower and in it for the long run; a smart decision is to invest in quality grow lighting systems. This isn’t something you want to cheap out on!

Have any more questions, comments, or tips? Comment them down below!

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Top 3 Reasons you want to replace your 1000W Metal Halide High Mast Lights with LED

There is a great opportunity to convert High Pressure Sodium and Metal Halide High Mast Lights over to LED, but what really are the true benefits? Is it worth all the hype and trouble?

Reduce your energy consumption by 60% or more

Converting to LED is a no brainer. You can easily replace a 1000W Metal Halide or HPS High mast light with a LED version that consumes between 350-400 Watts. When you take into account ballast draw of the old fixture, you are looking at an almost 66% reduction in energy consumption. But because LED’s allow for the addition of smart controls like motion sensors, turning off or turning down LEDs when no one is in the area can save you even more. LEDs are instant strike lights, that means, when you tell them to go, they go. Unlike metal halide and hps that take up to 30 minutes to restrike, LED’s are instant on and instant off, making them prime candidates for energy saving controls (read more below)

Create a brighter, safe environment

LEDs have a high “quality of light”, or better known as Color Rendering Index, or CRI for short. This is an index between 0 and 100, 0 being terrible, 100 being great. Sunlight is 100, being in a bat cave is 0. High Pressure Sodium is typically a 20-40 CRI and a color temperature of around 2700K. So very poor quality of light - that is why everything looks brown and yellow. Metal Halide is better, and some bulbs even rival that of LED, but typically they are around 60. LED is typically 70+, 80 is common. So the general rule we light to say is you need less quantity when you have better quality. And better quality makes it look brighter, and everything appears lit. Making your environment lit by LED High Mast Lights a safer working environment.

Control your lights with controls

Controls come in many forms. Some are simple fixture specific controls like motion sensors or photocells. Motion sensors turn on and off or on and dim a light, photocells turn on a light at dusk and off at dawn. But controls can be so much more. Think of LEDs as electronic lights, and add to it WIFI controls that allow you to control and monitor that light from within software. This allows you to schedule, control and monitor all your lights, turning off lights where you know no one will be around. Monitoring lights for faults - you know that a light is failing before it becomes an issue. And nothing is better than saving money than off. So embrace controls, because they will make a money saving experience even better.

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Top 5 Reasons you want to replace your 1000W Metal Halide High...

Top 5 Reasons you want to replace your 1000W Metal Halide High Mast Lights with LED

There is a great opportunity to convert High Pressure Sodium and Metal Halide High Mast Lights over to LED, but what really are the true benefits? Is it worth all the hype and trouble?

Reduce your energy consumption by 60% or more

Converting to LED is a no brainer. You can easily replace a 1000W Metal Halide or HPS High mast light with a LED version that consumes between 350-400 Watts. When you take into account ballast draw of the old fixture, you are looking at an almost 66% reduction in energy consumption. But because LED’s allow for the addition of smart controls like motion sensors, turning off or turning down LEDs when no one is in the area can save you even more. LEDs are instant strike lights, that means, when you tell them to go, they go. Unlike metal halide and hps that take up to 30 minutes to restrike, LED’s are instant on and instant off, making them prime candidates for energy saving controls (read more below)

Create a brighter, safe environment

LEDs have a high “quality of light”, or better known as Color Rendering Index, or CRI for short. This is an index between 0 and 100, 0 being terrible, 100 being great. Sunlight is 100, being in a bat cave is 0. High Pressure Sodium is typically a 20-40 CRI and a color temperature of around 2700K. So very poor quality of light - that is why everything looks brown and yellow. Metal Halide is better, and some bulbs even rival that of LED, but typically they are around 60. LED is typically 70+, 80 is common. So the general rule we light to say is you need less quantity when you have better quality. And better quality makes it look brighter, and everything appears lit. Making your environment lit by LED High Mast Lights a safer working environment.

Control your lights with controls

Controls come in many forms. Some are simple fixture specific controls like motion sensors or photocells. Motion sensors turn on and off or on and dim a light, photocells turn on a light at dusk and off at dawn. But controls can be so much more. Think of LEDs as electronic lights, and add to it WIFI controls that allow you to control and monitor that light from within software. This allows you to schedule, control and monitor all your lights, turning off lights where you know no one will be around. Monitoring lights for faults - you know that a light is failing before it becomes an issue. And nothing is better than saving money than off. So embrace controls, because they will make a money saving experience even better.

Dramatically reduce your maintenance costs

LEDs will last you a long time. But what does this really mean? There seems to be two definitive ways of defining the life of an LED fixture, the LEDs themselves and everything else.

The life of an LED is usually a measurement of L70, or how long will it take the LEDs themselves to deteriorate to 70% of initial lumen output. It doesn’t mean that LEDs are dead at that point, it means they have lost 30% of their initial output. The second measurement is typically how long will the LED system work before something fails. And typically this is a measurement of how long the LED driver will last.

Some L70’s are well past 100,000 hours, and very few are rated below 50,000 hours. It can be expected that a good high quality external LED driver should last 50,000 hours. So at a bare minimum, you should expect 50,000 hours out of your LED fixture. If your high mast lights run 12 hours a night, 365 days a year, that’s 4380 hours. That means 12+ years of maintenance free life. Compare that with the life of a metal halide or high pressure sodium bulb. And keep in mind, these bulbs lose their lumens quickly. Most replace them only when they completely fail, however, most should have been replaced many months before complete failure. So if you are not replacing bulbs and ballasts, then you are saving money!

New or retrofit - you decide

There are 2 options, replace the fixtures or retrofit the fixtures. To replace a 1000W Metal Halide, figure on 44,000-52,000 of LED Lumens to do the job. And MyLEDLightingGuide can supply LED Retrofit Kits up to 47,000+ lumens. But we also carry an amazing 400 Watt LED High Mast that produces 52,000 lumens that is the perfect high mast replacement fixture. Customers who purchase this light rave at its performance and adjust-ability. It just doesn’t point down, you can adjust the lighting angle to optimize distribution. But our retrofit kits are high performance units that are DLC Premium Listed. What option would we choose? That’s a tough question. Both options are great.

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Buying LED - Some Thoughts

It isn’t news in saving cash in your lights bill that LED is becoming the new standard. But with every new technology, the choices are occasionally smart and rich, and endless promotion conceals what actually is significant. Its simple if you comprehend the technology. If your new to the technology, you’ve got to try to discover what is or isn’t unimportant. Which makes the purchase choice even harder for those attempting to navigate this labyrinth of specifications and merchandise availability. And to confound the consumer more, there’s lots of data being presented that isn’t created based on any consented to standard. Read 10 distinct product booklets on what the marketers consider is the appropriate alternative to replace 1000W Metal-Halide and everything will be read by you Or what one producer calls day white is than what another maker believes day white is complete different. The best guidance is walk through exactly the same procedure when we choose our products to sell we do. We look for great engineering, functionality, efficacy and quality. Let us break that down to what that means.
The LED Litmus Test

Are the LED Lamps UL or ETL Qualified. This can be the security evaluation. No one desires an unsafe product. The merchandise must not be unable to perform with no possibility of danger. Are Energy Star or the bulbs DLC Rated? DLC (DLC) is a performance standard which makes sure the lamps are efficient and perform at a high standard. Recently the standard was expanded to include lights controls, although it generally employs just to LED lamps. Energy Star is a consumer standard that applies to many products including little LED screw in light bulbs. DLC didn’t have a provision for screw in light bulbs, but has lately shifted to permit some screw in LED light bulbs although up until lately.

Are the factories ISO Competent? A lot are not, a lot say they’re but are not. Some will say they abide by the ISO standards. What does that mean? Some will think of their own marketing buzz words that seem are extremely smart and great on paper, but are not ISO certified. To us, we are given the reassurance the products we provide our customers are constructed and analyzed within an exacting and consistent way with minimal number of danger of failure by ISO certificate.

The LED Efficiency Standard

What exactly is this? Well it really is efficacy, and the measurement, or a discussion of LED Effectiveness is called lumens/watt. Or how many lumens is it possible to create from 1 watt of power. A lumen is a measurement of lighting fixture that’s standard across all lighting fixture sources. With LED, efficiency is all over the graphs. The technology has been around for quite a long time, and you are able to locate efficacies including under 100 lumens per watt, if you take a look at the option of merchandise. The efficiency merchandise that is lower is often more value. But when you are doing the mathematics on how much is being spent on process over the life of the LED fixture, the savings in decreased energy spend immediately overshadow the savings at purchase time. The difference in LED efficiency is growing so extreme it is sensible to do payback evaluation between LED products. Case in point, our new efficient LED Retrofit Kits are actually available up to 165 lumens/watt. Two of our principal competitors are selling merchandise watt and 110 lumens/watt. The amount of cash you’ll save in decreased energy consumption over the life of the merchandise is staggering. And we’re of the belief that you’re converting over from Metal-Halide to conserve cash. Why not save all the money you can by getting the merchandise that is most effective?

So just how can you begin to identify the merchandise that is most effective? Two manners.

DLC Qualified Product. But merely seeing DLC isn’t enough. DLC is a standard of efficacy and performance. But there are DLC Standard 2 degrees and DLC Premium Premium. The DLC Premium Standard is the more efficient of the 2 standards. Products in DLC Premium are 20% more efficient than DLC Standard. In the example above, our retrofit kits at 165 lumens per watt are 40% more efficient. Look for these two symbols and more to the point, search for the DLC Premium Symbol. All our LED Retrofit Kits are DLC Premium Qualified.

2 Computing lumens per watt. Some sellers, and yet its simple will not furnish this info. If you need to compute lumens/watt, take the number of lumens they record and divide it by the number of watts it uses up. So if 10,000 is produced by a LED Lighting Fixture lumens and uses up 100 watts Recall, anything in the 80-110 lumens per watt range is usually technology that is old
Color Temperature

One of many other difficulties we see is customers do not comprehend color temperature. Its not untypical for a homeowner to visit a Home Depot store and buy a LED light bulb only find it it and to bring it home blue or too yellow. And if you have a look at the packaging, it is all confusing. You hear terms like Day White, or Natural White or Cool White as an alternative to talk in the universal language of color temperature. What all does this mean?

Here is an easy guide about what you should decide for what program

2800-3500K is a superb alternative for a property program.

4000-4600K is a superb option for an office surroundings

5000-5500K is an excellent option for a factory warehouse, health club or airport airport hangar

6000K + is a superb option for a jewelry store or in some lab surroundings.

The Guarantee - Read the small print

Another bit of advertising is the theory of merchandise guarantee. Once more, you’re able to use DLC as your guideline. Being a DLC Capable Merchandise, they’re required to come with a 5 year guarantee. Obviously, it’d be excellent of the guarantee fine print was all no nonsense, as they'ren’t consistently the situation. We’ve discovered the actual narratives of 5 and 10 year guarantees that never get implemented because somehow there’s always a claim that the mistake was due to installation error. Or the guarantees that assert which you must send the merchandise in if the problem is really a guarantee issue and it’ll be established. We call the “10 year hope guarantee” because you need to trust they’ll process the guarantee claim. With our retrofit kits, follow the directions, keep them dry, and that is about it. You’re covered.

We are

MyLEDLightingGuide

207 Highpoint Ave, Unit 7A

Portsmouth RI 02871

999.423.3191

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